Red Fin Suggestions and Advice Desired

[Ham]

Thanks Don.

I'm going to try a few of the expensive options. I may just give that Jackall a try.

[Brennan]

I was looking around on the net the other day and came across a bait made by river2sea called the v-joint wake. Has a couple of joints in it. Great looking colors also. The lip looks like it would wake really well....even found a video of it in the water on tacklewarehouse.com (i think). Price is 7.99 so its not out of sight expensive. I ordered a couple....Ill post what I think when they arrive. It is only 3.75 inches long though. Ive seen some other fancy wake baits in the 5 to 6 inch range. Do the fish shy away from the larger baits using this technique on TRock. I'm sure the 6 and 7 pounders probably wouldnt but will the 2.5-3pounders eat a bigger bait like that.

New to the site...really enjoy all the TRock info. I live just over 3 hours away in the Kansas City area and get down there a few times a year. Fished the tournament of Champions this year and havent been able to stop thinking about the lake since I left.

[abkeenan]

Well guys, A very nice old man up on Truman Lake show me this trick a few years back when I was heavy into tournament fishing, they work very well. Smaller bait profile matches the hatch on Truman and Table Rock very well.

But don't melt or try to bend the bills on a red fin.. Bad choice, I wasted a lot of good money trying this one.. They will break.. I've tried too thick of a bill they heat up and crack.

What I did was to go out and buy the cheaper double jointed and single stick bait from rapala 4" and 6" floating, I liked the color choices better, (Tennessee Shad and Silver Minnow) and then these guys have a smaller plastic bill on them, you can heat these up and bend the bill down to get the Wiggle-Diggle affect really nice. I have some old picture on this site somewhere maybe I can find them if you would like.

Red Fins work very well down here as Bill has shown, so it is just a matter of choice or just playing around to see if you can make a better mouse trap..

Good Fishing Everyone

Well its getting about that time for top water to heat up so I took out my redfins that don't "wake" right. I remember Don saying how he has tried using a bic lighter or matches to heat the bill and they crack. Well I decided to heat up the bills using a hair dryer and well...... it worked. I heated the plastic on the bill for about 30 seconds putting the hair dryer about 1/8th of an inch away from the bill and then just put even pressure on the bill with my thumb being sure not to got to fast to crack it nor too slow as it does cool pretty quick and re-harden. It worked perfectly and I have the perfect angle on the bills which is almost a 90 degree angle perpendicular to the bait. The angle of the bill is now basically identical to my Buckeye Wake Up and I really think this is going to make the redfin run fantastic. It shouldn't dive now retrieved at any speed which is the problem I have with just about all of my redins. I haven't thrown it yet but I am pretty sure this will be a home run so to speak. Just thought I'd share.

[MOhawghunter417]

Used a Bic lighter and heated up the bill on one of my Redfins...now it is worthless. Has about as much action as a hickory stick. I don't recommend this at all.

[abkeenan]

Well its getting about that time for top water to heat up so I took out my redfins that don't "wake" right. I remember Don saying how he has tried using a bic lighter or matches to heat the bill and they crack. Well I decided to heat up the bills using a hair dryer and well...... it worked. I heated the plastic on the bill for about 30 seconds putting the hair dryer about 1/8th of an inch away from the bill and then just put even pressure on the bill with my thumb being sure not to got to fast to crack it nor too slow as it does cool pretty quick and re-harden. It worked perfectly and I have the perfect angle on the bills which is almost a 90 degree angle perpendicular to the bait. The angle of the bill is now basically identical to my Buckeye Wake Up and I really think this is going to make the redfin run fantastic. It shouldn't dive now retrieved at any speed which is the problem I have with just about all of my redins. I haven't thrown it yet but I am pretty sure this will be a home run so to speak. Just thought I'd share.

Update:

I tested my "modified" red fins and they all failed. The angle was just too steep and ruined the action. I wouldn't recommend using a bic lighter at all as that will burn the bait and ruin it. I used a blow dryer and just reheated the bills for a 2nd time and put the original angle on them. A few I left just slightly more of an angle than the original. Will see how it goes.